“This job is amazing” – A Vaccination UK Nurse on Flexibility, Family Life and Fulfilment

What do you do?

My name is Nicole. My background is mental health nursing, so I’ve done that for about three or four years after I qualified, and then I moved on to doing practice nursing.

During practice nursing, we did different roles such as smear tests, blood tests, running asthma clinics and things like that. However, I was very interested in vaccinating. We’ve done baby clinics, running baby clinics during practice nursing. So I was more – I loved vaccination basically out of everything I’ve done at the GP.

What I do currently in my job is I go to schools and give vaccinations working for Vaccination UK. The vaccinations vary from diphtheria, tetanus and polio, which is given in year nine. We also give HPV, which stands for human papilloma virus. And we also give MMR, which protects against measles, mumps and rubella. And then every year we basically give the flu vaccine.

So there’s various vaccinations that we give. And yeah, I just love vaccination.

Vaccination UK, they are amazing. There’s a lot of benefits that come along with working with Vaccination UK.

Work-life balance, they’re very good. They also give petrol allowance. But they are amazing, very supportive.

What do you enjoy about vaccinating?

So I love basically when I’m vaccinating, knowing whether it’s a baby, a child, knowing that I’ve contributed to them being well in society.

Me giving a vaccine just helps me to know that I’ve basically reduced illness in some way or form. So I’ve protected them from what I’m giving them, such as it could be MMR, it could be HPV. We give various different vaccinations.

The main aim for vaccinating is to build herd immunity. That’s the main aim of why we give all these vaccinations. So herd immunity is basically built up in the community by vaccinating.

Why is vaccination so important right now?

It just goes to show the importance of vaccinating and protecting against these horrible diseases because sometimes unless you see yourself, some people don’t realise that it is real.

But when you hear about it in the news and stuff, you do understand that it is important. There are diseases out there that can unfortunately kill adults as well as children.

Where do you work and what does your day look like?

We cover three regions which is Hounslow, Hillingdon and Ealing, and we go to the schools. We start from reception going right up to year 11 and we just protect the children each year.

With the job you have to be driving. So in the morning, all the nurses meet at base, then we pack the vaccinations and everything else that we need, such as the syringes, the needles, the cotton wool, and most importantly the anaphylaxis kit in case someone has an allergic reaction.

Then we pack it in a car and we car share and go to the school.

Every day is very different. You could go into a school, you could be vaccinating a child and the session runs smoothly. You could have a very anxious child.

How do you support anxious children?

We definitely talk to them and let them understand about the vaccine and what we are giving.

Because some children, especially when you’re anxious, everything goes out your head and you’re not sure – why am I here? So we talk to them and give them a bit of understanding as in why the vaccine is very important.

Some children may need a little squashy toy or a little stress ball. It depends on the level of anxiety.

As a mental health nurse, I’m able to bring my skills to this because sometimes our mind plays games and we feel that we can’t do it, but actually we can. So I do give the children that encouragement and let them understand, you know, there’s no such word as can’t. We can do this.

Although it does take long for some children, it’s completely fine. Most of them do have it in the end. And even if they don’t, it’s not a problem. We do catch-up clinics where they can come with their parents.

What are your working hours like?

The hours are 8 to 4. So we come to the office at 8, pack the vaccines and everything else that we need, and then we drive to the school.

We aim to get to the school at 9am for a 9.30 start.

I do part-time, so I do 8 to 4 and four days a week, but because I love the job so much I always do that extra overtime whenever I can. I always do that catch-up clinic whenever I can.

How does the role fit around your family life?

Yeah exactly, it’s perfect. I’ve got children so it’s perfect with my family.

In the school holidays, I go on holiday, spend time with my family. But we do have nurses that work all year round and we do catch-up clinics at base for children that missed vaccinations in school.

It’s very flexible. I’m happy.

What are the challenges of the job?

I would say challenging parts for me can be sometimes there’s language barriers.

So parents may not understand or they may not understand what I’m saying because English is not their first language. But to overcome this, we do have on our portal where the parent or guardian fills out the consent form, they can change it to the language that they speak.

So although that is very challenging, there are options there to overcome that challenge.

What is Vaccination UK like to work for?

Vaccination UK, they are amazing. There’s a lot of benefits that come along with working with Vaccination UK.

Work-life balance, they’re very good. They also give petrol allowance. But they are amazing, very supportive.

We do get regular up-to-date training. Any change in the guidelines or legislation, we are updated with that via training.

The environment that you train in is very comfortable. It’s a nice environment.

What kind of nurse would suit this role?

You have to be approachable, communication skills is essential, be very observant as well, and basically enjoy what you do.

It can be a children’s nurse, mental health nurse like myself, or adult nursing – you’re more than welcome.

Working for Vaccination UK, you would be happy. You get what you give, if that makes sense, and even more.

What is the team like?

Yeah, definitely, we get on well. Obviously in every team there’s different personalities in the team.

But for me, being me, I’m always bubbly, I’m always happy. I just like to see the positive side of life.

The world would be boring if it was all the same, so I enjoy the different personalities.

How do you bring your personality into the role?

Yes, definitely. I do assemblies.

I go into the school and explain about the vaccinations. For example, HPV, which protects against a virus that can turn into different types of cancers.

There’s another time when I’ve done a presentation and the children were very anxious. They had a music lesson going on and I started singing with one of the children. Honestly, that calmed them right down.

Sometimes when you’re in a uniform, some children can feel intimidated. When I jumped on that mic, I was one of them.

My personality being me helped reduce the anxiety and they did have the vaccination in the end.

Do you enjoy your job?

Yeah, I really, really do enjoy it. Definitely enjoy it.

Because there’s nothing worse than being in a job where you don’t enjoy. As I come in, all my colleagues always say I’m happy and bubbly, so as I come into work I expect to leave work feeling the same way.

This job is amazing!